Volume 7, Issue No. 34
OPINION/COMMENTARY
/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /
. . . . . A community service of The Filipino Web Channel (TheFilipinoWebChannel@gmail. com) and the Philippine Village Voice (PhilVoiceNews@gmail.com) for the information and understanding of Filipinos and the diverse communities in North America . . . .
Our latest as of Monday, January 12, 2026
~ The gradual loss of advertising and customer support is the bane of Filipino newspapers, an inevitable outcome in the local publishing business. A confluence of factors has spelled disaster to what once was a robust media market. From a dozen or so periodicals, the number has gone down to at least five. One Filipino tabloid that initially survived has been wracked by scandal which, three years ago this month, has not been fully addressed by the parties involved.
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FILIPINO MEDIA SCENE IN TORONTO
One Fell Into Disgrace,
Others Due to Attrition
By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ
Editor, The Filipino Web Channel
“It is better to offer no excuse than a bad one.” ― Ge
TORONTO - Of the dozen or so newspapers in the Filipino community that had filled the void of information from the homeland, only a few, no higher than five, have managed to survive publishing challenges.
These are the fortnightlies and monthlies which continue to come out, perhaps below self-declared, unaudited circulation figures, probably as a matter of commitment to a dwindling number of advertisers.
The internet, and with it the arrival of social media - YouTube, Vimeo, Facebook, Instagram, etc. - had rendered print periodicals impracticable to operate profitably.
More so if these papers' target market is so small to sustain a dozen tabloids whose contents are boringly similar, if not a duplication of articles and photos appearing in others. Read one and you read them all.
That was what I observed when I moved here from California in 2010. Nothing of significance has changed, only the handful of stragglers trying to make it worthwhile to retain what they felt was their influence on the community.
The attrition was not entirely surprising. The few that stayed afloat relied on family and supporters, mostly from friendly advertisers who didn't care about the political leanings of the editors and owners of the paper.
One tabloid, The Philippine Reporter (TPR), had lived through 35 years ending April or May 2024 immersed in left-wing politics in the Philippines. (Related story: https://filwebchannelmagazine.blogspot.com/2025/10/garcia-couple-jailed-for-leftist.html).
No wonder, as its owners and editors, the spouses Hermie Garcia and Mila A. Garcia, appeared to have carried over to Toronto their alleged subversive activities that had resulted in their imprisonment once the strongman Ferdinand E. Marcos had declared martial law in the Philippines in September 1972.
The Garcias disgraced themselves by what amounted to a "criminal" enterprise deceiving not only two TPR writers - artist Michelle Chermaine Ramos and an Edmonton-based intern who did not want to be identified - but also the Department of Canadian Heritage and the National Ethnic Press and Media Council of Canada (NEPMCC).(Related video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTJc42WrFRQ).
For months, the two scribes were led to believe the release of their salaries from government-funded Local Journalism Initiative (LJI) were being withheld by an unidentified official of Canadian Heritage.
TPR and the Garcia couple being members of NEPMCC are recipients of taxpayer money granted by Canadian Heritage and disbursed by NEPMCC through LJI solely for the salaries of LJI-accredited reporters, in this case, Ms. Ramos and the intern.
Not only was the lie perpetrated on the two writers; the Garcias went up higher in the food chain to solidify their deception. (Full story: https://filwebchannelmagazine.blogspot.com/2023/12/issues-affecting-ethnic-press-and.html).
Hermie Garcia claimed a "grant guy" at Canadian Heritage had been impeding the release of the writers' salaries for some reason he himself had concocted.
Moreover, he also maintained that NEPMCC needed some forms or reports to be filled up for salaries to be turned over to them.
None of it was true.
NEPMCC managing director and board member Maria Voutsinas informed Ms. Ramos that everything Hermie Garcia told her was a fabrication.
The truth was that the NEPMCC had already released to Hermie Garcia the LJI grant money in full lump sum even before the LJI could begin, according to Ms. Voutsinas.
That meant salaries for Ms. Ramos and the Edmonton writer had been in Garcia's hands all along. The "grant guy" so called that Garcia had blamed was also fictitious.
It's been more than three years since the deeply disturbing complaint by Ms. Ramos against the husband-and-wife team running what now appears to be defunct TPR remains unacted, and perhaps ignored.
We shouldn't just let go of this. Filipino community leaders and the local press club must take note and act, for that tabloid had enshrined in its masthead (The Philippine Reporter) the very name of our homeland, and by extension, our people.
By inaction, should we just turn a blind eye and perpetuate the notion that Filipinos are corrupt, and that the debauchery obtaining in the homeland has found practitioners in our adopted country, specifically in the Greater Toronto Area? (Related video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9DER6NVdAI).
Ours and the country's reputation is at stake! (Copyright 2026. All Rights Reserved).
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